Bookish and not so Bookish Thoughts!

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746 Books has been a little quiet of late, for the usual reasons, but I am trying to get back into the swing of reading, commenting and tweeting about all your fantastic blogs. Bookish and Not So Bookish Thoughts, hosted by Christine at Bookishly Boisterous, is also a nice way to ease myself back in to more regular posting, which I hope I can get back to.

I’ve had a pretty amazing week at work as the legend that is Wilko Johnson and the wonderful Marian Keyes both visited HomePlace in the space of two days! Both events were wonderful – Wilko’s outlook on life following his cancer diagnosis and then unexpected cure is admirable and Marian is as lovely as you would imagine. She signed books and posed for photos for over an hour, charmed everyone and sent out Twitter feed into overdrive!

My new season programme at HomePlace also launched this week and I’m so excited that Andrew Motion, Val McDermid, Tessa Hadley, John Burnside and the amazing Viv Albertine will all be visiting in the next few months.

Although Easter now seems like a distant memory, I had quite a busy time, with two trips to Dublin in the space of one week to see two theatre adaptations of best – selling books. First up was Grief is the Thing with Feathers starring Cillian Murphy in an absolute tour-de-force of a performance.

Playing both the man and the Crow, Murphy was astonishing, particularly in the quieter, softer moments. A few days later, we took the twins to see Matilda The Musical and they had a complete ball. Matilda makes for a really successful musical and although a little different and a little darker than the book, we were all mesmerised.

Lately I’ve been trying to read more in the evenings and watch less telly, but we have been wowed by Killing Eve, the new BBC America show starring Sandra Oh and Fiona Shaw about a female hit woman and a British Intelligence Officer. It’s funny and smart and scary and perfect escapist TV. I’m also looking forward to the new series of Legion and Westworld.

As if I don’t have enough reading challenges in my life, myself and my wonderful 13 year old niece have challenged each other to see if we can read 40 books by the end of the summer holidays. We’ve set up a little What’s App chat to keep each other up to date, but I know that she will manage it no problem while I will probably struggle!

On that note, I am also considering whether or not to do 20 Books of Summer again this year. Despite completing the challenge in 2016, I only managed 16 books in 2017. Would it be cheeky to host 20 Books of Summer, but actually only do the 15 option? Or the 10? Decisions, decisions. Do let me know if you’d been planning to take part and I’ll see how much interest is out there.

So that’s been my life for the last few weeks, I hope to be back tomorrow with a review for the 1977 Club.

It sounds like you’ve had a busy start to the spring Cathy with some wonderful highlights.
I would love it if you did the 20 books of summer this year as it shapes my entire summer reading and I really don’t think anyone will mind if you decide to go for one of the smaller challenges. As other’s have pointed out maybe mix up some shorter books too? Yes, that’s me saying please do go ahead 😉

I’ve been doing the ’20 books of summer’ for the past two years. I had planned to take part again – but, that being said I would not be upset if you opted out. I’m planning to read at least 20 titles over the summer whether you do it or not.

I hope you continue with the “Reading Ireland” challenge next year. I love it – it gives me an excuse to read all those lovely Irish authors.

Saw Wilko Johnson at a music festival last year – was good!! Been looking for Killing Eve on line and on Sky since read your post but somebody at work tells me not yet started in U.K. – but sounds good!

I think you have the dream job Cathy 🙂 Killing Eve sounds brilliant, Fiona Shaw is always so watchable. Hopefully it will come onto a channel I can access soon! I’m also really hoping Grief is the Thing With Feathers transfers to London…

Cathy, I think it is totally okay to host 20 Books of Summer but go for 10 or 25 books yourself. I am also very jealous that you’ve been to see Matilda the Musical and I am really looking forward to Westworld returning too. 🙂

I’m catching up on some old posts since I took last week off from blogs, but if you decide to host the 20 Books Of Summer, maybe you could put quite a few novellas on your list! 🙂 It’s your challenge, you can do what you want!

Oh, I would love to see Matilda! What a great picture of your family standing in front of the theater!
And what fun to be doing a book challenge with your niece. I like Laila’s idea of reading a bunch of short books – that will help you with your niece *and* your 20 Books of Summer! 🙂